Features / Sector spotlight
Sector spotlight: Fashion
Fact…
• Bristol Weaving Mill has revived a cotton industry not seen in the city for 100 years.
• The UK consumes around 1.1 million tonnes of textiles per annum as clothing. Bristol Textile Recycling diverts 20 tonnes of unwanted textiles from landfill each day.
LABELS
There are only a handful of labels emerging from Bristol, That Thing and House of Junk being two of the more prominent. Formerly known as Shop Dutty, That Thing changed its name last year after a legal battle with Massimo Dutti. Both produce urban clothing available to buy online as well as in the That Thing store on Stokes Croft.
Events such as Love the Future of Fashion, the Hobbs Show and Bristol Fashion Week showcase the local and national talent here.
Kids’ clothing company The Lazy Jellyfish decamped from Barcelona, where it was founded in 2012, to Bristol in 2015 where it continues to make edgy clothing and accessories for children. Using certified organic textiles where possible and patterns reminiscent of the 80s and 90s, owner and creative director Bego Piñón says that Bristol is one of the best places in England to start a business, “unlike Spain where there seem to be more barriers and higher start-up costs”.
‘Emerging luxury womenswear brand’ Jokoto is headed up by Eloise Atwell and Hannah Bartlett. Based in central Bristol the pair meld sportswear, luxury production, tailoring and ethical production in their collections, currently stocked online, at the Assembly in Frome and soon to feature in a new shop on Old Market.
“The fashion landscape in Bristol is varied and has been hugely inspired by the cities music scene and diverse culture,” says Hannah. “Locally produced clothing and accessories are very popular, with shops like Co-LAB and That Thing stocking a great selection of local designers and makers,” although she goes on to identify a gap in the market for high-end, fashion forward items.
COUTURE AND BESPOKE
One of many dressmakers and seamstresses active in the city, Laura Davey makes bespoke dresses and wedding gowns – often ‘with a creative Bristol vibe!’ – in her Kingsdown studio. Booked up until September with commissions, she has recently launched a range of bridal accessories such as sashes and veils in her Etsy shop. “I think that generally Bristol is a city full of crafts people rather than fashion designers,” she says; “people are doing more interesting things in terms of making, technique, design and up cycling – doing their own thing rather than being trend led – which I think reflects the city in general.”
With a prominent shop front on Stokes Croft, Gilly Woo’s designs are known to many Bristolians. Like Laura, Gill celebrates Bristol’s principled approach: “I love that so many Bristol fashion businesses seem to focus on art, ethics and sustainability rather than chasing the money, businesses making bespoke items are difficult to scale but can offer a great lifestyle.” She is booked up for most of the year with bespoke commissions and has started offering sewing classes that allow people to make their own.
“Bristol is chock full of independent designers. Buying something from a maker gives you a unique connection with its origins and the labour and skill involved in its production,” she says.
“We’ve gained a reputation for being quite bold, opulent and experimental,” says Molly Lewis Smith of couture house Mishi May, who also makes costumes for film and television, currently working on a collaboration with Sky.
“I’d say Bristol is pretty anti fashion, I don’t see many people following trends here, Bristol’s got its own thing going on; it’s laid back, relaxed and open minded.”
INDEPENDENT DESIGNERS & MAKERS
Dash & Miller is the celebrated textile design studio supplying fabric to high-end brands in the UK. It stands alongside other manufacturers in the city, such as Botanical Inks – making naturally dyed fabrics and wool – and Working Wool – looking to fortify the UK’s wool market.
The Milliners Guild in Clifton brings together a series of designers in the specialised hat making field to design and sell headwear.
Award-winner digital embroiderer Jacky Puzey produces intricate artworks for clothing and interiors from her Easton studio. She collaborated with designer Sadie Clayton for London Fashion Week and has been selected on the Craft Council’s Hothouse 2016 development scheme. “It’s definitely growing”, she says of Bristol’s Fashion industry.
“I find a lot of inspiration in animal and botanical motifs, and I like to mix them up with graffiti and tattoo images, or try to create new abstract textures and motifs within the work.”
Grace Ekall is a textile and fashion designer who makes bespoke and limited edition clothes. She says the fashion landscape here is overridingly principled: “Clothes and accessories professionals here – are for the large majority, ethically and environmentally conscious when sourcing and making their designs.”
Tamay & Me is one such example, a collaboration based in the Bristol Textile Quarter between two women from England and Vietnam to produce indigo jackets with traditional Vietnamese embroidery.
Laura Griffin, a freelance seamstress and pattern cutter, designed the Tamay & Me pattern. “There’s an expanding textile community in Bristol, with an abundance of textile-orientated organisations,” she says. “Dash & Miller supply their textiles to high-end fashion labels internationally. Independent Bristol fashion labels however don’t yet have a reputation to the same degree. Lots of people are designing and making clothing in Bristol, so the skills are embedded within the city, although the market for high-quality fashion design is missing.”
“I try to push the boundaries of what knitwear is and can be,” says Amber Hards, a knitwear designer creating one-off and limited edition pieces; “garments with texture, volume and movement”.
“There is a massively diverse population of designers and makers in Bristol, covering lots of different aspects of the industry, from reworked vintage to streetwear, to couture and one off high fashion pieces. I think it is growing and becoming more aware of itself, people are connecting more”.
FESTIVAL FASHION
With Bristol’s festival culture comes a dedicated festival fashion scene. Companies like Madwag (as worn by Fat Boy Slim), Puckoo Couture, and Winifred Rose lead the charge.
Sarah Wags from Madwag moved to Bristol from London last year: “it was the best move I could have done for my business”.
She thinks the sector has huge potential: “Festival fashion is only just getting started! What began as a way to express yourself at festivals is now becoming more mainstream and was even all over the catwalks at London Fashion Week. We’re about to see a lot more people wearing sequins and lycra.
RECYCLING & ETHICS
Charity Labour Behind the Label which campaigns for garment workers’ rights worldwide has been working from its Bristol offices since 2002.
“We are small but mighty in relentlessly raising the profile of garment workers who need their stories to be told,” says Ilana Winterstein. “Our effective campaigning has been instrumental in pushing UK retailers to sign the Bangladesh Accord on Fire and Building Safety, ensuring Rana Plaza victims receive long-term compensation, supporting workers in Indonesia to receive legally-owed severance pay, and campaigning with Cambodian garment workers to demand a living wage, among many other cases.
A whole host of companies and individuals are active in recycling and upcycling clothes, many of them clustering around the new Bristol Textile Quarter in its St Philips workshops. “The most important part of our mission is to connect textile and fashion people together,” says founder Emma Hague, “ultimately helping to build a more local, more resilient textile economy here in Bristol”
Antiform is a ‘sustainable fashion lab’ dedicated to using waste and reclaimed materials. The company moved down from Leeds in 2014 to a new base in the Bristol Textiles House and is currently working with the Bristol Weaving Mill to produce a bespoke tweed from industry waste yarns to make a collection “woven and sewn in Bristol”.
The product portfolio continues to expand. Owner Lizzie Harrison says: “We are busy on some interiors projects and developing out knitwear range which is produced from waste industry wool yarn and knitted in Cornwall.”
“I am passionate about ethical clothing. There is an abundance of vintage shops and pre-loved boutiques, charity shops and a small but increasing number of small designer led companies,” says Linda Thomas, who makes luxury upcycled clothing in her eponymous company.
In St Philips, Bristol Textile Recyclers diverts unwanted textiles from landfill, reusing the items here and in Eastern Europe, Central Africa or South Asia, or recycling materials into clean cloth or energy.
Image – Bristol Textile Quarter